WELCOME TO THE OASIS OF ONE OF A KIND TIE DYE DESIGN…IRL!

INTRODUCTION

Have you ever stumbled upon a small online business and found yourself pondering: “Where exactly are these products made? I wonder what their workspace looks like? In what kind of conditions are their products stored until shipping?” Or maybe even, “Are these claims of being a small, one-person-in-home-operation even true at all?!” 

Whether these sorts of questions are evoked purely by curiosity and fascination, or maybe rather out of an abundance of caution surrounding cleanliness or legitimacy concerns — These sort of things are only natural to question before handing over your hard-earned money to an online shop you’ve never heard of before.

With that being said, this new “Tour the Tie Dye Studio” series of blog posts sets out to answer those questions and quench your curiosity, all at once! Whether you come from a place of intrigue or otherwise, I hope you enjoy this behind-the-scenes peek at the IRL side of Paradisiac Dyes!  

Welcome to a place I lovingly call: The Dungeon of Design (aka just my basement). This is where all of the tie dye you see here at Paradisiac Psychedelic Handmade Goods is hand-dyed from start to finish! After six years and counting of slowing evolving my ‘lil one-person-operation, I’ve decided it’s time to reveal a peek at where exactly all of the tie dye you see here on the site is hand-dyed!

A LITTLE ABOUT THE PERSON BEHIND IT AL

But first things first, I suppose now would be a good time to finally ’properly’ introduce myself for once. Hi there, my name is Rhiannon! I’m the one ‘n only person behind everything that is Paradisiac Psychedelic Handmade Goods! And by everything, I mean e v e r y t h i n g — It’s no exaggeration when I say: this is truly as small as small business possibly gets!

Then, later migrated to Shopify in late 2017 and shortly thereafter changed names to become the present day Paradisiac Dyes; The Online, One of a Kind Oasis of Tie Dye Design! But that’s enough about that for now, if you care to learn more about me personally, a brand spankin’ new About the Artist page is coming soon!

NOW FINALLY, LETS GET TO THE TOUR! 

If you were to descend into my basement dungeon, the first thing you’d see is what I very creatively call the…uh…main area. Yep, that’s the best I’ve got.

Here‘s where the majority of tie dyeing happens, amongst all of the varying sizes of plastic storage bins with the wire shelving / cabinet organizer contraptions inside of or on top of them.

These bins, which I refer to as splat racks, are where tied & ready-for-dye pieces are placed, then tie (or ice) dyed! 

Sometimes if I’m in need of more splat rack space, I’ll whip out a drying rack and stick it right inside of an XL storage tote. This way, I can transfer already dyed pieces here to finish up their 24hr molecular bonding rendezvous before rinsing.

 

 Another one of many things I’ve implemented over the years, in an attempt to streamline the process of crankin’ out custom commissions, are these half dozen drawers on a 3-tier shelving unit.

These drawers stay stocked full of pre-soda ash’d, ready-to-tie-then-dye items of all sorts: t-shirts, long sleeves, fleece, bedding, bandanas, scarves and more! 

Taking that idea a step further — across the studio in what I call the, uh…nook area next to the bar…is another drying rack, that holds a regularly refilled queue of pre-tied, ready-for-dye splatters & spirals of all sizes!

 

THE TIE DYE BAR

Wait, what was that non-chalant mention of a bar? Damn right I meant literal BAR! Smack dab in the center of the studio is the tie dye bar of my dreams...brought to life! And the best part of all: it’s PINK!

RANDOM FACT: This baby-pink bar-top is a 1950 original, but in damn near like-new condition; thanks to the mountain of clutter and thick layer of dust that inadvertently served to protect and preserve the surface over the course of recent decades (I wish I was kidding). That is, until one late summer night I set out on a mission and pulled a coup d'etat on the clutter…and TA-DA! (see before and after pics below)

I’m still in disbelief and overflowing with gratitude for this opportunity to create the tie dye bar and surrounding studio space of my literal dreams!

Throughout the last year, I've been putting a ton of time and effort into making the most out of this space I have to work with. The primary goal being to make it as efficient and functional as possible to best optimize my tie dye workflow!

So, would it really be a 'real' tie dye bar if it didn’t have an ice machine for ice dyeing anytime at the drop of a dime?!
My handy dandy ice maker resides on top of the bar, next to my beloved Good Molecules mini fridge!

Also, in a freezer over in the laundry area, is an entire shelf designated for stashing pre-made ice cubes (pictured above) — In the form of regular trays, plus two mini coolers full of nugget ice from the machine, too!

BEHIND THE BAR

Next up, behind the bar is the bulk of my dye collection, stored amongst the seven black, pink and white crates. Also stashed behind the bar are two storage  bins with extra empty dye jars,  seasonal decorations, photo props and other misc. supplies, as well as extra drying racks not in use.

Meanwhile, in the area just to the right of the bar is a built-in wall cubby thing. This awesome, retro built-in shelf is where extra backups of my most-used colors are kept, along with all of my 5lb dyes.

If you'd like to see my entire dye collection, complete with true-to-color swatches of over 120 dye shades, discontinued colors and experiments comparing shades, then head over to my brand new page which has all of my fiber reactive dye related content in one place! (It'll be updated to include even more content as it's published, too!) 

LAST STOP: THE LAUNDRY ROOM

Last but not least is where multiple steps of the tie dyeing process take place: the laundry room!

Pictured above is a little something I've coined:

The soda ash’n station is just a jumbo, rectangular plastic tote which perfectly fits a drying rack, as well as a smaller plastic container (for soaking fabric in sodium carbonate solution), right alongside it. 

First, fabric is pre-washed, soaked in soda ash solution for 1+ hours, then rung out and hung to dampen or dry before being tied into its destined design! 

Ready to rinse designs are brought back over to the tub sink and thoroughly rinsed before being double-washed with a combination of  Synthrapol (a professional textile detergent that removes excess dye particles) and Gain detergent.

Lastly, tie dyes are machine dried before being ready to head upstairs to be photographed and/or packaged up to ship out!

TA-DA! That's the entire process every single tie dye design from Paradisiac Dyes goes through before it ends up here on the site! 

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE...

Welcome to a little place I like to call: TIE DYE STUDIO LITE 2.0! So, earlier in this post when I said that my basement is where "all" of the tie dye is handmade...well, that's not quite the whole truth.
Reality is, I spend my time split between two households - so here at my boyfriend's house I have a second, super mini yet fully functional tie dye set-up!

Down to having a double of every single dye color in my collection! Some are stored amongst the empty Dharma dye jars I've accumulated over time, but once I ran out of those I started using these adorable, tiny containers from the dollar store; which are especially the perfect size for my lesser used colors!

My favorite part of all is this glass desk, to this day I'm still over the moon about being able to use it for tie dyeing! I especially love utilizing it for photography, too!(example pictured below).

This is also where all of my non-cat safe plants reside. Currently that only consists of a yucca cane, aloe and sunset jade succulent. 

CONCLUSION

BUT WAIT, that’s still not all…

CLOFFICE!
...IS COMING SOON!

If you’ve miraculously made it this far and think you might be interested in more behind the scenes content, be sure to bookmark/favorite this blog…I guess? (because I don’t do the whole email harassment newsletter thing!) 

I’m excited to begin publishing more content here on a regular, consistent basis. So, with that being said: What type of content would you most love to see featured on my blog? Leave a comment below and let me know! 

Also, connect with me on Instagram @PARADISIACDYES for even more #DESIGNSTIEDYEFOR on the daily and so much more - including Mindscape Mondays & Caturday Saturdays!

Also in Dungeon of Design